Hayden Ploeger, a 5th grader at Mt. Pilchuck Elementary was searching the web one day and came up with a great idea.

Ploeger found out that a company called TerraCycle will take CapriSun pouches and turn them into usable items such as purses, pencil cases and tote bags.

To do this, they offer two cents per pouch to anyone who wants to send them to the company.
Ploeger’s brain started to move and realized that by collecting these pouches he could not only help keep them out of landfills, but he could use the money to help other students in need.

In October of last year, Ploeger, an ASB representative from Mrs. Poremba’s fifth grade class at Mt. Pilchuck Elementary School, went to his fellow ASB representatives and asked them if they would support the CapriSun Pouch Brigade.

The answer was an astounding “yes”.

Ploeger explained to the ASB reps that he would like to have everyone in the school place their used CapriSun pouches in a marked container and then use the money to help fellow students in Africa through the Africa School Assistance Project.

“He did a lot of online research and decided on a non-profit charity based in the U.S.A. that builds and supplies schools for elementary aged kids in Africa.  The charity is called Africa School Assistance Project,” mom Reshal Ploeger said.

Ploeger even created a custom lid that would only fit CapriSun Pouches so that garbage wasn’t thrown into the container.

“Hayden built a custom lid out of plywood with a slit in the top that only empty juice pouches would fit through.  He painted it CapriSun blue,” she explains.

Students at the school brought in pouches from home and dropped them in boxes after lunch.
The goal was to collect 8,000 pouches by the last day of school. That morning they had reached 7,895 pouches, but after a quick announcement over the intercom, students added 106 pouches, surpassing their goal by just one pouch.

The students raised $160.02 for a school in Tanzania.

Susan Bachar, Executive Director for Africa School Assistance Program, is in Tanzania with a group of volunteers.

Bacher called Ploeger and the kids at Mt. Pilchuck, “good citizens of the world.”

The money they raised is enough to provide a classroom of desks and supplies needed to teach in Tanzania.
Terracycle has paid the shipping for 16 copy paper boxes full of pouches.

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